Patrick T. Harker took office on July 1, 2015, as the
11th president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of
Philadelphia. He was reappointed for his second five-year term effective March
1, 2021. In this role, Harker participates on the Federal Open Market Committee,
which formulates the nation’s monetary policy.
As an engineer by training, Harker has continued to apply his research and
receive patents throughout his career. He considers the effect of automation on
the labor force as “the perfect intersection” of engineering and economics.
Other technological influences, including artificial intelligence and machine
learning, are also playing a part in the Third District’s and the nation’s
economy. By focusing on economic mobility, one of the Bank’s research
priorities, the Bank’s researchers are looking for ways to create sustained,
inclusive growth through practical applications. Targeting such research to the
employment field can help workers, communities, and industries plan for
inevitable disruptions by connecting workers to training programs while
encouraging discussions on the skills that are vital to a constantly changing
market.
Before taking office at the Philadelphia Fed, Harker was the 26th president
of the University of Delaware. He was also a professor of business
administration at the university’s Alfred Lerner College of Business and
Economics and a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the College
of Engineering.
Before joining the University of Delaware in 2007, Harker was dean and
Reliance Professor of Management and Private Enterprise at the Wharton School of
the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to being appointed dean in 2000, Harker
was the Wharton School’s interim dean and deputy dean as well as the chair of
its Operations and Information Management Department. In 1991, he was the
youngest faculty member in Wharton’s history to be awarded an endowed
professorship as UPS Transportation Professor of the Private Sector. He has
published/edited nine books and more than 100 professional articles. From 1996
to 1999, he served as editor-in-chief of the journal Operations Research.
In 2012, Harker was named a fellow of the Institute for Operations Research
and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) and a charter fellow of the National
Academy of Inventors. He was also named a White House fellow by President George
H. W. Bush in 1991 and was a special assistant to FBI Director William S.
Sessions from 1991 to 1992.
Harker is a board member of both the Chamber of Commerce for Greater
Philadelphia and its Select Greater Philadelphia Council. He is also a board
member at the Science Center in Philadelphia. Previously, he was on the boards
of Catholic Relief Services, Pepco Holdings, Inc., and Huntsman Corporation and
was a founding member of the board of advisors for Decision Lens, Inc. He was
also a nonbanking Class B director of the Philadelphia Fed from 2012 to 2015.
Harker has a Ph.D. in civil and urban engineering, an M.A. in economics, and an
M.S.E. and B.S.E. in civil engineering, all from the University of
Pennsylvania.
